Friday, June 15, 2012

Our new addition

Introducing the newest member of our family!  We couldn't be happier to actually be official owners of a VAN!!!!!  

It is so comfortable, roomy, smooth, and just plain exciting!  When we're driving around town, Matthew and I often look at each other, laugh, and say, "Wow, we have a van!"  Leah doesn't let us forget how much she likes to be "up high".  (We like it, too.)


She even told us that we can keep the van from getting crunched by putting trampolines on the front and the back.  That way, she said, other cars would just bounce off! :)

Saturday, June 2, 2012

Drawing

Leah drew pictures for everyone in the family...


...including herself :)

Thursday, February 23, 2012

Oh yeah, I have a blog...

So, lately, when I have free time, I find I would rather read a book than do anything on the computer.  Haha, it is just so fun being a bookworm.  The kids have gotten better at letting me curl up with an open book, too (imagine how Grant used to force my book closed and yell "ee oh!!" for "the end!!").

Anyway, before I get back to reading, here is a quick recap on our past (very busy) few months:

We had a fabulous Christmas with both families, up until Leah got some sort of stomach flu :(

Then we all got sick for a while, and then visited our families again when Matthew had a presentation at a conference in Vancouver.

Then... we went to DISNEYWORLD!!  It was soooo fun.  I want to go back already!  I know it will be a loong time before we go again, but I just can't stop thinking about how much fun we had!
(Someday this deserves its own post, or even an entire blog, but this mention will have to do for now.)
And in case you are wondering, our kids were AWESOME!  They were sweethearts on the flights (thank you, Grandpa and Grandma and Uncle Jeremy and almost-Aunt Yunjoo!) and the funnest little buddies to have at the parks!

Grant got sick on the last day, then I got sick the next day, Leah got sick the day after, and Matthew got sick the day after that.  You know how it goes.  It was the kind of illness (some kind of coldish-flu mix) that just sticks around for weeks.  We finally just got over the last of the symptoms!  Sad thing is, though, that my parents and niece and nephews all got sick too, right after getting home from Florida.  At least we weren't sick for the whole trip!

Afterwards, Uncle Dan came home!  Actually, he's Matt's brother, but we call him Uncle Dan around the kids :)  Uncle Dan has been in Brazil on a church mission for the past two years, so this was his first time meeting Grant!  (We went to the airport to greet him when he arrived, but all my pictures are blurry... everyone was moving, and it was indoors, and well, I just didn't end up with any pictures worth putting up here.)

And now that we're all feeling a bit better, and we have no more trips on the horizon, we're ready for life to get back to normal (while trying to figure out what 'normal' even is).  And now, if you'll excuse me, I think I'll get back to my book... I was just getting up to an exciting part :)

Thursday, December 22, 2011

Cute kiddos

Grant was so sad when he couldn't find what he wanted to play with...

...then so happy when I found it for him!  This was the first time I got him to smile on command and say "eeee!".

Sunday, December 18, 2011

Snowflakes

One of our favorite winter traditions is cutting paper snowflakes.  In Utah, we would start cutting them at the first snowfall of the year.  Here, that might not happen, so we just started a little after Thanksgiving :)

Check out this year's creations!


Thursday, December 15, 2011

Decorating

It is amazing what a mess it takes to make our place look so pretty!

This was the first time we let Leah help us decorate.  She was a very good girl!  And she got to stay up realllly late :)

Grant woke up the next morning and was completely enchanted by all the lights!  And the buttons on this Christmas pillow.  He loves pointing out buttons :)

Happy girl!
And happy boy!

Monday, December 12, 2011

Four years old!!!

Leah turned four last weekend!  This was such a fun birthday for Leah.  She was sooo excited about every little thing!  It was really easy (and fun) to make her feel special, since she was full of birthday excitement already!  
 
Here's our beautiful birthday girl in her new birthday dress.

Ready for church!

Hugging her gigantic birthday balloon!

Opening presents!  (We had a "family party" on Leah's actual birthday.)

Leah with all her presents and wrapping paper!

For weeks before her birthday, Leah consistently told us that she wanted "muffins and carrots... and broccoli" for her special birthday dinner.  So that's what we gave her!  (We rounded out the meal, don't worry.)

Happy birthday to Leah...

Blowing out FOUR candles!  (again)

 Just loving her new sleeping bag and enormous balloon!

Sharing with baby brother... just a tiny guy with a big balloon :)